Open Scholarship or Covert Agendas?

The Case Against NSEP Funding
For the Study of Africa

by the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS)

Scholars of Africa vs. The CIA and The Department of Defense

Scholars of Africa since the 1970s have rejected any connections with national intelligence and military agencies. The hard-won protection of African studies from military and intelligence agencies' control and agendas is now threatened by the implementation of the National Security Education Program (NSEP), formerly known as the "Boren Bill."

NSEP funds scholarships for undergraduate students for study abroad, fellowships to U.S. students in graduate programs, and grants to institutions of higher education.

Such funding is sorely needed. We certainly need more study of world areas beyond the borders of Europe and North America, and especially Africa. But the NSEP program was compromised at its inception when it was firmly lodged in the military and intelligence agencies. As NSEP's own brochure notes: "Program policies and direction are provided by the Secretary of Defense in consultation with the 13 member National Security Education Board."

The majority of Board members are representatives of Federal Agencies, including most notably representatives of the Department of Defense and the Director of Central Intelligence. While an advisory committee of outside experts assists the Board and chooses actual participants, the criteria for selection of students and priorities among world regions, languages, and cultures is determined by the Secretary of Defense.

Scholars of Africa resist ties to U.S. intelligence agencies and the Pentagon because of the long history of Western interventions supporting repressive rulers and working against legitimate and elected leaders in Africa. For over thirty years U.S. military and intelligence operations have:

• Provided covert support to colonial and settler regimes from the white-minority regime in Southern Rhodesia, through the Portuguese colonial regimes in Angola, Mozambique and Guinea Bissau, to apartheid in South Africa.
• Subverted progressive governments and national liberation movements from Patrice Lumumba to Kwame Nkrumah to Nelson Mandela.
• Installed and/or supported dictators like Mobutu in Zaire, Idi Amin in Uganda, and Siad Barre in Somalia.
• Fomented civil war and conflicts through covert support for 'contra' factions such as UNITA in Angola and Renamo in Mozambique.

The end of the Cold War has not, moreover, diminished the inclination for covert intervention against popularly supported governments and movements. Recent Congressional investigations reveal that the CIA has not only pushed forward highly misleading analyses, but has played a direct role in subverting popular movements -- as in undermining the elected government of Jean Bertrand Aristide in Haiti.

Relations between the scholars and peoples of North America and Africa can only be maintained on the basis that scholarly activities and exchanges are public and transparent. This is impossible if academic inquiry is determined by hidden "national security" and military goals.

NSEP represents an attempt by U.S. intelligence agencies and the Pentagon to direct scholars for their own purposes, with likely anti-democratic or repressive consequences.

Indeed, funding from NSEP can only serve to cut off academic relations with Africa, including research throughout the continent. Individual scholars in the field will be suspect and may find themselves in unpleasant and even dangerous situations.

As over a 100 scholars protested in a statement sponsored by ACAS and published in the Chronicle of Higher Education:

Funding from national security agencies threatens the openness of scholarly inquiry and publication, the physical safety of scholars and students overseas, and cooperation between African and U.S. scholars. (June 2, 1993, p. A8)

• reject funding for African studies from the NSEP program,
• publicize NSEP's links to military and intelligence agencies, and
• work to secure additional funding from non-military/intelligence agencies for students of African studies, particularly those students traditionally excluded from overseas study programs.

We... strongly object to the passing of the National Security Education Act.... The link which the legislation seeks to make between U.S. intelligence/defence and funding for African scholarship will seriously compromise the virtues of honesty and integrity among both American and African scholars and institutions.
Association of University Teachers, University of Zimbabwe, Aug. 1992

We are gravely concerned... at the presence of the Director of the CIA in the oversight of the program... Linking university based research to U.S. national security agencies will restrict our already narrow research opportunities; it will endanger the physical safety of scholars and our students studying abroad; and it will jeopardize the cooperation and safety of those we study and collaborate with in these regions"
Presidents of the African Studies Assn., Latin American Studies Assn., and Middle East Studies Assn., Feb. 1992 Past experience, in South Asia as elsewhere, amply demonstrates the perils of connections, however tenuous, between scholars and U.S. national security agencies. Possible conse-quences range from mistrust and lack of cooperation to physical violence against U.S. scholars and their colleagues abroad...
South Asia Council, April 1992

Founded in 1977, ACAS is a group of scholars and students of Africa dedicated to:

• formulating alternative analyses of Africa and U.S. government policy,
• developing communication and action networks between the peoples and scholars of Africa and the United States, and
• mobilizing support in the United States on critical, current issues related to Africa.

Members of ACAS receive the ACAS Bulletin, Action Alerts, and publications such as this leaflet. To support ACAS and receive these materials become a member! Dues are based on annual income. For membership information click here:

Adotei Akwei (Amnesty International), Merle Bowen (U. of Illinois), Carolyn Brown (City College, CUNY), Jim Cason, Allan Cooper (Otterbein College), Jennifer Davis (American Committee on Africa), William Derman (Michigan State U.), Ed Ferguson (Five Colleges Inc.), Allen Green (Wesleyan U.), Frank Holmquist (Hampshire College), Allen Isaacman (U. of Minnesota), Willard R. Johnson (MIT), Tilden LeMelle (U. of the District of Columbia), Pearl-Alice Marsh, Bill Martin (U. of Illinois), Bill Minter (APIC), James Mittelman (American U.), Catherine Newbury (U. of North Carolina), Thomas Painter (CARE), Hans Panofsky (Northwestern U.), Christine Root, Steven Rubert (Oregon State U.), Joel Samoff (Stanford U.), Ann Seidman (Clark U.), Jean Sindab (National Council of Churches), Meredeth Turshen (Rutgers U.), Daniel Volman, Immanuel Wallerstein (SUNY-Binghamton), David Wiley (Michigan State U.).

*Affiliation for identification purposes only

Provided by the Association of Concerned Africa Scholars (ACAS)